The present invention relates to an improvement in mowerconditioners.
Most of these machines are drawn behind a tractor, or semimounted in a rear lateral position in relation to the tractor. These machines are therefore not easy to handle, bulky and difficult to drive in the working position. Moreover they are difficult to use in the transport position, either by reason of their bulk and weight or by reason of their non-functional adaptation to the tractor.
In order to remedy these drawbacks it has been proposed that a mower-conditioner, in the working position, may be disposed no longer behind a tractor necessary for its operation, but laterally beside the said tractor.
A mower-conditioner thus hitched to a tractor is easy to handle by reason of the fact that in turning the momentary centres of rotation of the wheels of the tractor and of the machine are substantially coincident. Thus there is no risk of running over already cut fodder or of crushing the still standing fodder.
Moreover, in order further to increase the compactness and the output of such a mower-conditioner, it is proposed to equip it with a cutting mechanism of working width (L) greater than the conditioning width (l) separating the two walls of the conditioning passage of the machine.
The purpose of the present invention is to simplify the drive, that is to say both the device for coupling in the working position and the device for rotating drive of the cutting mechanism and the conditioning mechanism of a mower-conditioner of the type as described above, without thereby increasing its overall width.